Chap­ter 235 cen­ters on a deeply emo­tion­al dia­logue between Saint and Mar­ty Tooms, focused on the haunt­ing mem­o­ry of Cal­lie Mon­trose. As their con­ver­sa­tion unfolds, Tooms appears emo­tion­al­ly unrav­elled, unable to mask the pain he still car­ries. Saint watch­es qui­et­ly as he attempts to speak, his voice crack­ing while his eyes brim with grief. He con­fess­es to feel­ing pow­er­less dur­ing the trag­ic night Cal­lie expe­ri­enced com­pli­ca­tions from her pregnancy—an event that left scars he nev­er quite healed from. Though he had no med­ical train­ing, he still blames him­self for not doing more. The guilt, wrapped in help­less­ness, has sat with him for decades. His trem­bling hands tight­en when he recalls the moment he real­ized he was los­ing her, and noth­ing he did could change that out­come. Each word he speaks is steeped in regret, but also in endur­ing love.

As Tooms con­tin­ues, the mem­o­ry of Cal­lie is treat­ed with rev­er­ence, as if she were still present in the room. He shares that Cal­lie had con­fid­ed in him about the assault she suffered—how her own father had vio­lat­ed her trust and body. The rev­e­la­tion does­n’t come as a shock to Saint, but it chills her nonethe­less, a painful con­fir­ma­tion of what she already sus­pect­ed. Tooms admits he nev­er told Nix the truth, not because he didn’t trust him, but because he didn’t want to destroy him. Keep­ing secrets became a form of protection—not only for Nix, but for the mem­o­ry of Cal­lie. It wasn’t about hid­ing shame, but pre­serv­ing dig­ni­ty. Saint lis­tens with­out inter­rup­tion, her own heart grow­ing heavy with the knowl­edge of what was done and the silence that fol­lowed. The com­plex­i­ty of Tooms’ loy­al­ty cuts through the air like a blade.

Tooms’s choice to remain silent about Callie’s father—Richie—was both self­less and pun­ish­ing. He explains that he once wrote to Richie, warn­ing him that the peace he sought would nev­er arrive. The let­ter was nev­er a threat in the tra­di­tion­al sense, but a promise that jus­tice, in some form, would fol­low him. Saint sens­es the fury that still lingers beneath Tooms’s gen­tle demeanor—a qui­et rage that jus­tice had nev­er ful­ly come. This injus­tice, root­ed in a town that turned a blind eye, now sits between them as they speak. Mar­ty does not wish to redeem him­self through con­fes­sion; he sim­ply wants some­one to remem­ber the truth. For decades, he has car­ried this sto­ry alone, fear­ing what might hap­pen if it were ever spo­ken aloud. Now, with Saint, he finds a small sliv­er of relief.

In her silence, Saint doesn’t just offer comfort—she pro­vides some­thing more valu­able: belief. She real­izes Tooms isn’t look­ing for for­give­ness; he only wants Cal­lie to be seen and remem­bered for who she was, not the tragedy she became. Saint’s thoughts drift to her daugh­ter, Char­lotte, and how his­to­ry often repeats through silence and secre­cy. The par­al­lels are painful. She won­ders if pro­tect­ing some­one by hid­ing the truth ever actu­al­ly keeps them safe. The price of silence, she’s learn­ing, can span gen­er­a­tions. And yet, Tooms’s actions were nev­er self­ish; they were shaped by love, regret, and the instinct to shield oth­ers from harm. His heart, though bat­tered by mem­o­ry, remains anchored to Callie’s name. That loy­al­ty res­onates with Saint.

As their con­ver­sa­tion draws to a close, the emo­tion­al toll is etched on both their faces. In a moment of qui­et con­nec­tion, Saint leans for­ward and places a hand on Tooms’s shoul­der. There are no dra­mat­ic dec­la­ra­tions, no promis­es of redemption—just a shared under­stand­ing of loss and loy­al­ty. The embrace that fol­lows is brief but deeply human, an acknowl­edge­ment that trau­ma binds peo­ple in ways words can­not. The emo­tion­al weight of what has been revealed lingers, and in it, a frag­ile bond takes shape. Saint feels the weight of his­to­ry set­tle around her shoul­ders, and she knows that this moment will remain with her for the rest of her life. The chap­ter clos­es with­out fan­fare, but its qui­et inten­si­ty speaks vol­umes. In a world full of noise, some truths are whispered—and still, they echo the loud­est.